May 2019 Foster Care Special Edition

found that in areas of
abject poverty, teachers
were twice as likely to
leave mid-year or before
their third year of
service.
We know that there are
constant macro systems
being put into place to
combat these numbers
and support teachers,
but what can be done
on a more micro scale.
Let’s look at the aforementioned term self-care: what do we really know about this term, when
should we be using it, and does it actually help?
Compassion fatigue, secondary traumatic stress, vicarious trauma, these are all terms that can
more commonly be used to describe “burnout,” which is usually how we describe a co-worker
who is on the verge of quitting. Burnout comes from many different sources, but one of the main
contributors can be from working trauma-adjacent to students that are greatly impacted by past
or present experiences. And if you are working in a school, affluent or otherwise, you have
students who have experienced trauma. To give you an example, we have all heard of the ACE
study, which collected data from participants to demonstrate the effects of adverse childhood
experiences. The study showed the higher your ACE score, the more likely you were to have
serious medical and emotional issues. A typical response to the ACE score might be a one or a two
for most people. But when looking at another study specific to foster care, it showed that one of
our most vulnerable populations reported that 70% had an ACE score of 5 or more. This of course
is troubling for the youth that are experiencing these traumas, but when focusing on the teachers
and staff that work with them, we are finding that without proper support and self-care they are
up against challenging odds.
What are some of the signs that I might be getting close to burning out? They can at times be very
similar to symptoms that are associated with first-hand trauma: isolation, depression, difficulty
focusing, aggression, anxiety, insomnia, excessive drinking, appetite changes, anger/sadness. It
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